


hello hello, can you hear me now

by QueenWithABeeThrone



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Arranged Marriage, Mollymauk Tealeaf Lives, Other, Pining, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-09-30 14:29:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20448635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenWithABeeThrone/pseuds/QueenWithABeeThrone
Summary: Caleb should be asleep by now. Frumpkin would alert him, after all, if anything disturbed him.But he can’t sleep. Whitestone is on his mind, Whitestone and residuum and——gods, the boy his grandparents had betrothed him to. Whoever he was.or: Caleb's grandparents once tried to arrange a match for him, but things didn't quite work out the way they hoped. now, years later, Caleb and the Mighty Nein in Whitestone, the same city the family of his once-fiancé rules over. then they meet a gnome in a pub...





	hello hello, can you hear me now

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DragonBandit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonBandit/gifts).

> title is from Fleurie's "Can You Hear Me Now".
> 
> this was supposed to be longer, but the deadline is approaching fast. one day I might write a sequel for this but for now, this fic stands alone.
> 
> thanks to Ally from the WM server for her last-minute German language help!

When Bren was young, his grandparents on his mother’s side—who were never very happy that his mother had left a comfortable life of plenty to marry his father and live in Blumenthal—had betrothed him to a noble son from far away.

His mother had not been pleased. “How _dare_ you!” she had shouted at her parents, behind closed doors, where she had thought Bren wouldn’t be listening in. He was, though. He’d always been curious even then. “How dare you interfere in my _son’s_ life! He’s only twelve, he’s too young to be betrothed to anyone! Especially not a child younger than he is!”

“He will be the heir to the estate,” his grandfather had snapped, “this is an advantageous match, surely you must see that as well! The de Rolos are an old, old lineage, and your son’s magic would—”

“He is a _boy_, magic or no magic,” his mother had snarled back. “You would see that if you took your head out of your ass and stopped thinking about _advantageous matches_ for _five fucking minutes_!”

“Now, now, Una, dear—” his grandmother had started.

“Don’t! _Don’t_,” his mother had shrieked. “I’m taking Bren, and if Leofric and I see your faces or the faces of your servants and spies in thirty feet of our home, I’ll plant a bolt in their kneecaps!”

“You wouldn’t _dare_!”

“Just you fucking watch me!” The door had flung open then, and Bren jumped back. His mother didn’t even say anything to him about his eavesdropping, just grabbed his arm a little too tightly. “We’re going now,” she had said, her tone brooking no argument. “Where’s your father?”

“Um—chatting with the butler,” said Bren, still reeling. He’d never really liked his grandparents, but their library was far better than the one at Blumenthal, he had to give them that much. “Downstairs. Mama, what—”

“Bren,” said his mother, her voice softening and her grip loosening, “I want the best life for you. But most of all, I want you to _choose_ the best life for yourself. If your grandparents were to choose your spouse for you, I have this feeling they would choose exactly the worst person for you to be saddled with for the rest of your life.” Her voice held a note of disdain for the idea, and Bren remembered how she and his father had met, how they’d defied his grandparents’ wishes to elope, leaving behind her inheritance and a prospective spouse that had later turned out to be a boorish cheater of the worst sort. “I want you,” she had said, “to always have a choice. Always.”

After they left, she never spoke to her parents again. She kept throwing his grandparents’ letters into the fire, and Bren had only managed to open one of them to read once, curious over the contents, and had frowned at the choice his grandparents had picked for him: a firstborn son of a family in Tal’Dorei, so far away from his beloved parents that Bren couldn’t help but wonder if the boy had been selected to spite them.

But he had a choice. He’d always had a choice. When the Academy came calling, he chose to come. When Ikithon had asked him if he wanted to serve his Empire, he chose to serve.

When the time came to prove himself, he chose.

He chose very poorly.

\--

As is the case with so many things involving the Mighty Nein, the detour to Whitestone had been an accident. They had, in accordance with what Molly had called “a Moonweaver thing”, been aiming for Lyrengorn, where the Moonweaver’s Ribbons had, for thousands of years, been used as a kind of visual poetry by the skyswimmers of Lyrengorn. Unfortunately, one too many encounters with bandits had forced them onto a different path, this one through the Parchwood and into Whitestone territory, where they had decided to camp out for the night.

Caleb can’t actually complain too much about it. He knows for a fact that Whitestone produces residuum, and it can’t hurt to see if he can get his hands on some of it. Perhaps it might be key to accomplishing his goals, nebulous and unwieldy as they are. Certainly, for once he’ll be the one choosing to use them, instead of having them forced underneath his skin, into his very flesh.

They could push through the woods and into the city proper, Caleb supposes, and find a real inn. But they’re tired enough that almost everyone has fallen fast asleep, Caduceus’ bass rumbling competing with Nott’s crackly snoring. Jester’s tail is just about the only thing active in the bubble right now, flicking back and forth as she sleeps, a smile on her face.

Frumpkin’s shadow sits above them, a feline sentinel. Caleb should be asleep by now. Frumpkin would alert him, after all, if anything disturbed him.

But he can’t sleep. Whitestone is on his mind, Whitestone and residuum and—

—gods, the boy his grandparents had betrothed him to. Whoever he was.

Caleb doesn’t know very much about the de Rolos of Whitestone. He knows the heir was a swordsman of some skill and aspired to adventure, or else Ikithon wouldn’t have taken him aside to have someone drill him in swordsmanship when he learned of Bren’s betrothal. He knows that Bren Aldric Ermendrud might’ve been a fair choice for a nobleman’s son, but Caleb Widogast is no choice at all. He only hopes they found someone else for their son, someone much more deserving than he is.

As for Caleb himself—

Mollymauk crawls into the bubble and says, “Do you really have to stay in here to keep it going?”

“_Ja,_ I have to,” says Caleb. “It’ll dissolve otherwise. Did you see anything?”

Molly shrugs, and says, “Thought I saw a bear in the distance behind the tree line, but it didn’t get close enough for me to know for sure, so.” He steps gingerly over the sleeping bodies of the Mighty Nein to lie down beside Caleb, propping his head up on Yasha’s back. She shifts in her sleep, as if used to Molly getting in her space like this. “I thought you’d be asleep by now. Unless you were watching through Frumpkin?”

“No,” says Caleb. “I only—couldn’t sleep, was all.”

“Don’t you have a spell for that?” Molly asks, red eyes seemingly focusing on him. Caleb’s not sure, considering just how solidly red those eyes are. He’d found them unsettling once. Now he half-thinks he understands what the poets meant, claiming they could drown in someone’s eyes. Molly’s eyes are the finest of wines, and Caleb could drown himself in them and be merrily drunk.

Which is exactly why he can’t afford to. Which is exactly why he looks away, careful, so careful, not to look so long.

“_Ja,_,” he says, “but it isn’t something I can cast on myself.” He’d know. He’s tried. The spell isn’t meant for casting on oneself, but for catching a bit of time for strategy and perhaps a retreat in the midst of battle. Besides, there are some dreams that a handful of sand isn’t strong enough to chase away. “Do you—”

“I’ve got ways for that,” Molly assures him. He gently shakes Caduceus and Yasha awake, pecks them both on the cheek before sending them out of the dome, then gingerly clambers over more sleeping bodies to lie down with his head in Caleb’s lap. A hand is already rummaging around in a pocket somewhere in the folds of his colorful coat. “Think I’ve still got some ground-up passionflower in here somewhere. If you swallow a bit of it you’ll start to feel sleepy in no time.”

“I—used to know someone who would take passionflower tea to sleep better,” says Caleb, blinking away images of Astrid with her slender fingers wrapped around a porcelain cup. “But I did not think it reached beyond the Zemni Fields.”

“We did a couple of shows out there,” says Molly, drawing out a packet that smells, sure enough, of passionflower. “I picked it up from this herbalist who could do incredible things with her tongue, and it was—I was still a little new at the time?” He laughs, softly. “Had a lot of nightmares. This helped me, it might help you.”

“You’re certain?” Caleb asks, hesitantly plucking the packet from Molly’s fingers.

“Would I be offering if I wasn’t?” Molly asks, which is a fair point. “Just dip your finger in and suck off what sticks, then give it a couple of minutes.”

Caleb does as told, dipping his finger into the packet and sucking off the powder clinging to his skin. It tastes mildly earthy on his tongue, like green grass in the midst of summer, and he lies down, adjusting so he doesn’t wake Beau or Jester in their sleep, and so Jester’s tail doesn’t smack into his face.

“How long does it take?” he asks.

“Two minutes, maybe three,” says Molly. “What do you plan to do when we walk into town tomorrow?”

“Ask around for magical supplies,” says Caleb. “There is a—a very rare magical component that can increase the potency of a spell, and they produce and refine and sell most of it from here.” He shifts around as Beau moves in her sleep, mumbling something about _fuckin’ lions_ and weakly punching nothing. “They are notorious for keeping it tightly under wraps, though, so it would be somewhat, um, difficult to procure.”

“Just say the word, Caleb,” Molly says, “and I’ll turn on the charm and get them to hand it over. If push comes to shove, and if you really need it, we’ll probably steal it.” There’s a soft huff against Caleb’s thigh as Molly shifts position as well. “Although I’d rather save stealing it for if the owners are arseholes. And if they’re nobles, there’s a nonzero chance they would be.”

Caleb laughs, feeling his eyelids start fluttering downwards. Perhaps he should introduce Molly to his grandparents sometime. If his grandparents will still accept him.

“You laughed!” Molly says.

“I am not made of stone, Mollymauk,” says Caleb.

“Could’ve fooled me,” says Molly. “Sounds nice, though. You laughing.” There’s another snort of laughter, before he says, his tail petting Caleb’s ankle, “Gods, we’re both getting sleepy, aren’t we?”

“Your medicine works, so, yes,” says Caleb, eyes beginning to drift closer. “See you in the morning, Mr. Mollymauk.”

“You too, Mr. Caleb.”

\--

In the history books of Whitestone to come, historians will name the return of the de Rolos’ lost firstborn son to Whitestone as a momentous occasion that happened through pure chance. They will say that had it not been for observant citizens of Whitestone, he might forever have remained an unsolved mystery, a skeleton in the family’s closet: the rebellious firstborn, who left to seek his fortunes elsewhere, in darker places, never to be heard from again.

The history books will leave this out: when the de Rolos’ lost firstborn son came back to them, he and his friends were half-drunk in a bar with a pun for a name, and planning how to ask after Whitestone’s prized residuum.

Or how to steal it.

\--

Whitestone is a bustling, growing city, and people come in and out of it all the time—to trade, to visit, to stay, or just to pass through on their way to somewhere else. It’s not as white as the town’s name implies, which is something of a disappointment, but apparently it had been named for the whitestone _mines_, not the actual look of the city. Which is misleading as hell.

And the city looks pretty good. The streets are mostly clean if somewhat covered in slush and melted snow, the people are friendly and keen on any tourism that passes by, and some of the structures are new and exciting, like the new-looking clock tower, where every hour, the bell chimes and a scene unfolds above them, played out by painted constructs. Beyond that is a large tree in the center of town, and Caduceus, right beside Molly, says, “Oh, that’s a nice tree. I wonder if it’s got anything to say.”

“It’s a tree, it probably complains about kids climbing in its branches,” says Molly. He can’t look away from it, though—it’s so verdant and eye-catching that it looks out of place here, like a tree from a fairytale instead of a real tree here in the real world, leaves so green he half-thinks he’s looking at an illustration from a child’s book, or from Jester’s sketchbook. “What else could trees even talk about?”

“You’d be surprised,” says Caduceus, completely missing the rhetorical nature of Molly’s question. “They see a lot of things, trees, and they’re pretty gossipy. They’re usually pretty slow to talk, though, especially the older ones, so they don’t tend to make for great conversationalists.”

“Ah,” says Molly, deciding not to argue.

“They don’t really complain a lot about kids in their branches,” Caduceus says, reflectively. “I think the older they get, the more they like it.”

Jester, squeezing between them both, says, “Wow, that’s a pretty big tree! But ours is _way better_.”

“Oh, certainly,” says Caduceus, beaming. “Ours has lights.”

“And a weasel living in it,” says Molly. “Which reminds me, is Sprinkle with you, or—”

“Yes, of course he’s with me!” On cue, a slightly bedraggled-looking crimson weasel wriggles out of Jester’s blouse’s collar. She coos at it, scratching over the top of its little head, but Molly doesn’t miss its thousand-yard state like it’s seen horrors no weasel should see. Poor bastard. “You’re so _cute_,” Jester coos at the weasel.

_And traumatized,_ Molly doesn’t say, looking back at the tree. Something about it seems almost—familiar. Like a home he’s never known. Or rather—

He stops that thought right in its tracks. Best not to follow it down its path. Best to leave the past buried in the dirt where it belongs.

He tears his eyes away from the tree, and stomps down on the yearning in his heart. “So,” he says, forcing a smile, “let’s find a place to stay first, and start asking around about residuum?”

“I thought we were already done with that?” Fjord asks, turning around to squint at Molly from the front of the cart. Beau smacks Fjord’s shoulder with a murmured reminder to keep his eyes on the road, and Fjord quickly turns back, casting maybe the briefest glance over his shoulder towards Molly. “And what do you want with residuum, anyway, Molly?”

Molly squints back at Fjord. Months on, and he’s still a little thrown when an accent more in line with the nobles Molly’s conned over the years comes out of Fjord’s mouth, instead of the low drawl he’s gotten used to. “It’s not what I want with it,” he says, “but I said maybe I’d take a look.”

“Speaking of looks,” says Beau, “sure don’t think they get a lot of lavender tieflings through here.” She nods towards a small group of women in simple clothes with baskets of laundry, gaping at Molly in shock. One of them’s even dropped her basket, and clothes have spilled out across the dirt-packed ground. “I think you got a fan club,” she says, but there’s a note to her voice like she doesn’t think so.

Molly cranes his neck towards the women, and smiles at them, showing his fangs. He snaps off a lazy salute, and one of them startles, her eyes going wide before she pivots towards her friends and whispers—well, _something_. He doesn’t know. He’s too far away to catch it, and they fade into the background with time and distance anyway.

“Rude,” Jester huffs.

“Eh,” says Molly. “Nothing I haven’t seen before.” Three years of existence have taught him that there’s always going to be someone looking for any excuse to treat another person with deep disrespect, and usually that excuse is “this person is obviously different from me and mine”. At this point, he’s figured they’re really not worth listening to, most of the time. “Why, Beau, are you jealous I have a fan club?”

Beau sticks her tongue out at him. “Just keep flattering yourself,” she says.

Yasha doesn’t say anything, but her eyes flick towards Molly. _You okay?_ she doesn’t ask, but the question is there anyway, hanging between them.

Molly smiles, answering the question. _I’m fine._

The women slip out of his mind when they draw up next to a tavern, making room for names far worse for a tavern to bear than the Step Right Inn. “Good Knight’s Rest,” says Beau, and Molly grins and says, “The Verge Inn.”

He ducks a ball bearing thrown at his head with a laugh, and only glances briefly at Caleb.

And a warmth blooms in the middle of Molly’s chest, when he sees Caleb’s small, soft smile.

\--

Whitestone is—different, from what Caleb had imagined. When he had listened in on his grandparents’ attempt to convince his mother to marry him off to a scion of Whitestone, he had imagined a place as remote and unhappy as his grandparents’ house, where the people scurried about underfoot and out of sight, afraid to upset their betters. Whitestone is _remote_, certainly, situated as it is in the Alabaster Sierras, but there is an openness to the city that seems opposed to his grandparents’ hard, stern demeanor.

Bren might’ve thrived in this city, he imagines. Had his mother allowed the match, he would’ve been brought here. And perhaps—

Well, perhaps she and his father would still be _alive_.

But they are not, and this is the first time that Caleb has ever set foot in the homeland of the boy he might’ve once married. He wonders idly who that boy might be right now, and if he had ever grown up to marry someone else, or if he’d gone on to answer the call of adventure instead.

Nott finds them a big enough corner table for eight people and a cat with a penchant for sunny spots, and Frumpkin claims the circle of sunlight in the middle of the table with a look daring anyone else to come challenge him for it. Caleb takes his customary seat next to Nott, who’s sorting through her buttons as the rest of the Nein disperse to speak to the bartender at the counter and order drinks as well as keys for rooms.

Nott says, “So, um. Remember when you told me about You-Know-Who?”

Caleb winces, and says, “Astrid?”

“Nnnno,” says Nott. “The _other_ one.”

“Eodwulf?”

“The _other_ other one,” says Nott. “Your fiancé?”

Ah. The one he’d spoken of once to her and her alone, when they were walking through the tunnels to Xhorhas to save her husband. “_Ja_, I remember,” he says. “Why?”

“I could track him down right now,” Nott offers. “He’s the eldest son of the ruling family, right? He’s got to be around here somewhere. And, y’know, you can’t get any better than _firstborn son of a posh family_.”

Caleb flushes a bright red, his eyes briefly darting towards Mollymauk, speaking to the bartender. He winks, they laugh, he leans in to whisper something in their ear, and they smile at him. Molly turns away from the bartender, and Caleb looks away before those roving red eyes can meet his, can somehow impossibly see his clammy hands, his racing heartbeat screaming _mine mine mine._

Mollymauk is not his, could never be.

“No,” says Caleb. “_Nein_, Nott, I—it is better that I don’t contact him. I would only, hah, _disappoint_ him.” His swordsmanship has grown rusty over the years, and there is, of course, the small matter of his murder of his own parents.

“You wouldn’t disappoint him,” says Nott, fiercely stubborn in her bias towards him. “If anything, _he’d_ have to prove he’s not a disappointment to _you_. And if he is, or if he treats you badly,” she adds, as an afterthought, “I’ll cut his kneecaps off.”

“I do not plan to meet with him,” says Caleb, his heart warming at his friend’s protectiveness, “but in case we do, Nott, I will be sure to keep you between the both of us. You would be a far more intimidating threat than I am.”

“Damn right I am,” Nott says, before Molly struts up to them and deposits a plate full of meats in front of her. She gasps with delight and all but inhales half the food on the plate in record time, as Molly sits down on Caleb’s other side.

Caleb’s traitorous heart claws wildly at his rib cage with every beat, trying to free itself from his flesh and bones. Molly runs hot, as though there’s an ever-burning fire under his skin, and Caleb’s breath catches in his throat as Molly’s weight presses against his side.

It would be terribly inconvenient for the noble de Rolo family, he’s certain, if the man marrying their firstborn was in love with someone else. Better, then, to leave them alone, to let them be. They need not know that he once might’ve married their son, when he asks them for residuum.

“We’re trying to get the bartender to tell us what they’re reading,” Molly says, nodding to the group still gathered at the bar. As Caleb watches, Jester’s mirror image flickers into existence, distracting the bartender as Jester ducks low and tries to sneak past the counter. The bartender flicks a nut that passes through the illusory Jester’s head, frowns, then turns around to glare at the real Jester, who’s gotten halfway through the door. “So far, nobody’s caught the title. Except me, of course—I’m _very_ charming.”

“You cast Charm Person to get them to tell you the title,” says Caleb, understanding. Hope, that traitorous little thing, bubbles up in his throat.

The bartender, meanwhile, has called a patron over, a gnome with white hair who clambers onto a bar stool to even attempt to meet Beauregard’s eyes without straining her neck.

“And slid them two gold to sweeten the pot,” says Molly. “It’s _The Archer’s Heart_, by the way, but don’t tell Jester.” He leans forward on the table and says to Nott, “Same goes for you, Nott. You can’t tell Jester the title.”

“But she’d love it!” Nott says, halfway through a bacon-wrapped turkey leg.

“I kinda promised I wouldn’t tell everybody else,” says Molly. “The only reason I’m telling you is because you didn’t come along with the rest of the group.”

“Well, then,” says Caleb, “your secret is safe with us.”

Molly’s mouth quirks upward in a small smile, and Caleb ducks his head as his cheeks grow warm, trying to think about—about alchemy, and the study of changing one thing to another, and the dunamantic exercises Essek has taught him. Anything but Mollymauk and his warm body pressed to Caleb’s side.

Then Beau swaggers back with trays full of mead and—

“Hello,” says the small, white-haired gnome from before, the holy symbol of Sarenrae hanging around her neck. Something about her seems familiar, but even Caleb with his perfect memory cannot remember where he’s seen her before. “I hear you folk won a drinking contest back in Hupperdook?”

“Guys,” says Beau, putting the tray down, “Pike here says she can take all of us.”

“I didn’t say _all_,” says Pike, modestly, “I only said you guys looked like I could take _some_ of you.”

“You’d fall over in five minutes!” Nott declares.

“Well,” says Pike, squinting at Nott as if sizing her up. “You, I can definitely take.”

\--

This is what the Mighty Nein, most of whom are well on their way to drunk, do not see or hear:

Pike slips away from the little knot of adventurers, quietly thanking Sarenrae for the foresight that had her leaving her armor at home before she came to visit Percy and Vex tonight. Otherwise she doesn’t think she’d have slipped their notice so easily—it was already a close enough call with Caduceus’ flicking an ear in her direction.

She sways as she walks into the alleyway, and has to hold her hand out to steady herself. With a murmur, she casts a Lesser Restoration on herself, her hands glowing with divine light as she clears away her own headache. It isn’t much, but it’s enough for what she has to do.

She pulls a Stone of Farspeech out of her pocket, and says, “Percy? Vex? He’s here. I found him.”

\--

“Why,” says Fjord, squinting at Caleb, “d’we need more reshi—redi—that green stuff? We’ve got what w’need ‘ready from the, the, whatsitsname, the forge? With th’Stones.”

“Dusts,” Caduceus corrects.

“Dusts,” Fjord amends.

“Because he’s a wizard and he needs to get more powerful, next question,” says Nott.

Molly giggles and leans against Caleb. Gosh, he’s warm for a human. Must be all that fire magic. “For _big_ magic stuff, I bet,” Molly says, curling his tail around Caleb’s thigh. “Either that or he wants a fancy ring.”

“It’s magic stuff,” says Caleb, slurring his words somewhat. He’s drunk enough that his hand tangles in Molly’s hair and scratches lightly, as if Molly is his tabby cat. “You have very soft hair,” Caleb informs him, his tone grave as if this is the most important information he has.

“Thank you, I’ve worked to keep it soft,” Molly says, bumping a horn against Caleb’s temple.

“_You are very soft,_” Caleb sings, “_and you are very purple, lila lila lila._” He reaches up a hand to pat Molly’s cheek, a silly little smile on his face.

“What’s that mean?” Jester asks, sipping from a mug of hot chocolate.

“Purple,” Caleb tells her, solemnly. “And you are _klein und blau._”

“There’s like, two blue people here,” says Beau, squinting at Caleb. “Or three, counting Jester’s duplicate.”

“I didn’t bring out my duplicate,” says Jester, confused. “Hey, Caduceus, how long has Pike been gone?”

“Pike’s gone?” Beau asks, suddenly alarmed and shooting up, nearly knocking her elbow into Yasha’s side. Molly, through the pleasant haze of alcohol that’s settled over his brain, snorts out a quiet laugh at the sight. “Where’d she go? We’re not done yet, she didn’t take on Yasha—”

“Sh’took everybody else but Jes and Cad on,” Fjord mumbles into the table, “sh’was cheatin’. Bet m’gold on it.”

“I abstained from the contest,” says Yasha, gently pulling Beau back down. “And I think she went out to the bathroom?”

“I hope she’s okay,” says Caduceus, brow furrowing. “It’s been a while, she might need to see someone for that if she’s having bowel problems.”

Then the door flings open. Molly squints at the light coming in, the woman striding in—a dark-haired woman with slightly pointed ears and familiar eyes, a trio of blue feathers arranged artfully behind an ear. There is a bow slung across her back and a quiver full of arrows hanging from her hip, and she is regal, beautiful, and searching for someone.

Her eyes land on him.

His breath catches in his throat.

“Lucien?” she whispers.

And Molly says, as the panic bubbles in his chest, as he quickly and hurriedly stands up and nearly topples over, “Oh, I just happen to have one of those faces! So sorry to bother you, ma’am, we were just _leaving_—”

“Who the fuck are _you_?” Beau snaps out at the woman, getting to her feet far more gracefully than Molly. Which isn’t fair, really. Beau’s the one who drank more than he did.

“Watch it!” calls the bartender, and Molly can see all the patrons in the bar now glaring at the Mighty Nein, as if they’ve crossed a line they hadn’t even known was there. A couple are staring at Molly in shock. “That’s the _Baroness_ you’re talking to! That’s Lady Vex’ahlia de Rolo!”

Caleb lurches to his feet in shock, eyes wide. “_Eure Hochgeborene,_” he says, bowing his head slightly, like he at least knows _of_ her. Something about the way he says it makes Molly frown at him, trying to puzzle out what it is about Caleb’s tone that strikes him as strange. After all, Caleb’s probably done his research on the ruling family of Whitestone. It shouldn’t be strange, that he knows the name of one of them.

“Oh,” says Caduceus, “what’d he say?”

“She’s royalty!” Jester gasps.

“Oh,” says Fjord, head facedown on the table, “great. Gimme a sec.”

The woman, Vex’ahlia, nods curtly to Caleb. But her eyes are on Molly, and Molly alone.

She strides forward, and wraps Molly up in a hug, tight and warm. Molly blinks stupidly for a moment, then very slowly, hugs back.

And she says, “My _son_, my boy—you came _home._”

\--

And somewhere in Caleb’s chest, hope dies, flickering out like a candle in the wind.


End file.
